PARIS: Prime Minister Gabriel Attal on Wednesday defended French secularism following the resignation of a Paris school principal who received death threats after asking a student to remove her Muslim veil on the premises.
Attal, a former education minister, said the state would be filing a complaint against the student over falsely accusing the headmaster of mistreatment during the incident in late February.
“The state... will always stand with these officials, those who are on the frontline faced with these breaches of secularism, these attempts of Islamist entryism in our education establishments,” he said during the evening news on the TF1 television channel.
Secularism and religion are hot-button issues in France, which is home to Europe’s largest Muslim community.
In 2004, authorities banned school children from wearing “signs or outfits by which students ostensibly show a religious affiliation” such as headscarves, turbans or kippas on the basis of the country’s secular laws which are meant to guarantee neutrality in state institutions.
The government last year said it was also banning the abaya — a garment worn by Muslim women that covers the body from the neck to the feet — in schools.
The headmaster’s departure comes amid deep tensions in the country following a series of incidents including the killing of a teacher by an Islamist former pupil last year.
The principal at the Maurice-Ravel lycee in eastern Paris quit after receiving death threats online following an altercation with a student last month, officials told AFP on Tuesday.
On February 28, he had asked three students to remove their Islamic headscarves on school premises, but one of them — an adult who was at the school for vocational training — refused and an altercation ensued, according to prosecutors. The principal later received death threats online.
In a message addressed to the school’s staff, quoted by French communist daily L’Humanite, the principal said that he had taken the decision to leave for his “safety and that of the school.”
Education officials said he had taken “early retirement.”
Attal told TF1 the headmaster had been supposed to retire in June, and decided to leave a little earlier.
The student had lodged a complaint against the principal, accusing him of mistreating her during the incident.
She told French daily Le Parisien that she had been “hit hard on the arm” by the headmaster.
But the Paris prosecutor’s office on Wednesday told AFP that her complaint had been dismissed.
An investigation has been opened into cyber-harassment following the death threats against the headmaster.
Politicians from across the spectrum on Wednesday said they were shocked by the resignation.
“It’s a disgrace,” Bruno Retailleau, the head of the right-wing Republicans faction in the Senate upper house, said on X (former Twitter).
Boris Vallaud, the head of the Socialist deputies in the National Assembly lower house, told television broadcaster France 2 the incident was “a collective failure.”
Marion Marechal, the granddaughter of far-right patriarch Jean-Marie Le Pen and a far-right politician herself, spoke on Sud Radio of a “defeat of the state” in the face of “the Islamist gangrene.”
Maud Bregeon, a lawmaker with President Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance party, also took aim at “an Islamist movement.”
“Authority lies with school heads and teachers, and we have a duty to support this educational community,” Bregeon said.
Socialist Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo called the principal to “assure him of her total support and solidarity,” said her office, adding she was “appalled and dismayed.”
The education ministry earlier said that the principal’s decision to leave his post was “understandable given the seriousness of the attacks against him.”
Education Minister Nicole Belloubet had visited the school in early March and deplored the “unacceptable attacks.”
A 26-year-old man has been arrested for making death threats against the principal on the Internet. He is due to stand trial in April.
The uproar comes as dozens of French schools have received attack threats in recent weeks.
Attal has pledged to “hunt down” the people responsible for sending them.
Around 50 schools in Paris received new bomb threats on Wednesday, some including a “very violent video,” education authorities said. The mayor’s office said classes were briefly interrupted for security checks.
The prime minister pledged to increase security, including near schools, after the Islamic State jihadist group claimed responsibility for the killing of 137 people at a Moscow concert on Friday.
France’s PM stands with teachers after school chief quits in hijab row
https://arab.news/cuyqr
France’s PM stands with teachers after school chief quits in hijab row
- An investigation has been opened into cyber-harassment following the death threats against the headmaster
Macron discusses MidEast crisis with Israel’s Netanyahu, Egypt’s El-Sisi
- Macron had also reiterated to Netanyahu that France wanted an immediate and lasting ceasefire in Gaza
PARIS: French President Emmanuel Macron held phone calls on Monday with Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi to discuss ways of avoiding an escalation in the Middle East crisis, said France and Egypt.
The French presidency said Macron, in his call with Netanyahu, had reaffirmed Paris’s desire to avoid an escalation in the Middle East and to stand up to what it said were Iran’s efforts to destabilize the region.
The French presidency added that Macron had also reiterated to Netanyahu that France wanted an immediate and lasting ceasefire in Gaza and said Paris was working to ease tensions arising from clashes on the border between Israel and Lebanon.
In a separate statement, Egyptian presidential spokesperson Ahmed Fahmy said Macron had also discussed the Middle East crisis with the Egyptian leader and that both Macron and El-Sisi had agreed on the need to avoid further regional escalation.
India’s Kohli fined for angry outburst at IPL umpires
- Kohli fell early in Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s chase after he was caught by Kolkata Knight Riders Harshit Rana
- Visuals on social media showed Kohli having discussion with umpire after the match as pundits weighed in on dismissal
NEW DELHI: India star Virat Kohli has been fined half his match fee for an angry outburst in response to his dismissal from an Indian Premier League match, the league said Monday.
Kohli fell early in Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s chase on Sunday after he was caught and bowled by Kolkata Knight Riders pace bowler Harshit Rana and his team went on to lose by one run at Kolkata’s Eden Gardens.
But the former India captain looked confident the high full-toss was above his waist as the umpires checked for a no-ball.
TV umpire Michael Gough declared it out after technology suggested the trajectory of the ball dipped below the waist of the batsman, who returned furious after exchanging words with the on-field officials.
“Kohli committed a Level 1 offense under Article 2.8 of the IPL’s Code of Conduct,” an IPL statement said.
“He admitted to the offense and accepted the Match Referee’s sanction.”
Visuals on social media showed Kohli having a long discussion with an umpire after the match ended and pundits weighed in on the dismissal.
Former India batsman Navjot Singh Sidhu slammed the call and asked for the “rules to be changed“
Ex-India quick Irfan Pathan said on X, formerly Twitter, “if Virat Kohli was standing at the popping crease the ball would have been lower than his measured waist height, making it a legal delivery.”
Kohli has been the top run-getter in the T20 tournament so far with 379 runs in eight matches but his team Bengaluru remains bottom of the 10-team table with just one win.
Philippines, US forces to take military drills into disputed South China Sea
- More than 16,000 Filipino, American soldiers are involved in the annual exercises this year
- Beijing, Philippines have overlapping claims in the resource-rich South China Sea
MANILA: Filipino and US forces began their annual joint military drills on Monday, segments of which will, for the first time, take place outside of the Philippines’ territorial waters following a string of maritime clashes between Manila and Beijing in the disputed South China Sea.
The exercises, known as Balikatan — Tagalog for shoulder-to-shoulder — will run up until May 10 and involve over 16,000 military personnel, along with more than 250 Australian and French forces.
For the first time since the annual drills started over 30 years ago, the Philippines and the US will conduct joint naval drills beyond the 12 nautical miles (22.2 km) of the Philippines’ territorial waters, in parts of the open sea claimed by China.
“This exercise represents the essence of unity, collective responsibility, and enduring partnership between the Republic of the Philippines and the United States of America and other partners,” Philippines’ military chief Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr. said during the opening ceremony.
“It is not a partnership of convenience but rather a clear reflection of our shared history, unwavering commitment to democracy and respect for international law in our pursuit of peace and security in the Indo-Pacific region.”
Throughout the three-week exercise, soldiers from the two militaries will operate out of a joint command center to perform four major activities with a focus on countering maritime, air, land, and cyber attacks.
“It’s the first time that we are going beyond our (12) nautical miles,” Maj. Gen. Marvin Licudine, Philippines exercise director, told reporters.
The Balikatan training operations are not directed at a particular country, he said, but are more focused on the “development of interoperability,” with an increased complexity of the drills and scenarios to let soldiers learn more from one another.
The joint exercises take place as Philippine and Chinese coast guard and other vessels have featured in a series of increasingly tense territorial face-offs since last year, including Chinese use of water cannons against a Philippine vessel in the South China Sea last month, causing damage and injuries.
After the incident, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said his government would take countermeasures against “illegal, coercive, aggressive, and dangerous attacks” by the Chinese Coast Guard.
“We seek no conflict with any nation, more so nations that purport and claim to be our friends but we will not be cowed into silence, submission, or subservience,” Marcos had said in a statement.
The Philippines and China, along with several other countries, have overlapping claims in the resource-rich waterway, where a bulk of the world’s commerce and oil transits.
Beijing has been increasing its military activity over the past few years, with the Chinese Coast Guard regularly encroaching on the Philippine part of the waters, the West Philippine Sea, despite a 2016 ruling by an international tribunal in The Hague dismissing China’s expansive claims.
Don McLain Gill, an international studies lecturer at De La Salle University in Manila, said the scope of this year’s Balikatan is a “clear reflection of Manila’s commitment to exercise its sovereignty and sovereign rights within its exclusive economic zone.
“This year ’s exercise will also involve complex maritime security issues such as simulations of recovering islands from hostile forces, which add a practical dimension to collective self defense efforts by the like-minded partners,” he told Arab News.
“Clearly, securing the WPS based on international law will not bode well for China’s expansionist interests. While the Balikatan is aimed at improving joint preparedness amidst emerging challenges in the region, the challenge posed by China's expansionism is clearly one of the critical factors that provoke regional security.”
Suspected extremists abducted over 110 civilians in Mali: sources
DAKAR: Suspected extremists in central Mali are holding more than 110 civilians whom they abducted six days ago, local sources told AFP on Monday.
Three buses carrying the civilians were stopped on April 16 by “jihadists,” who forced the vehicles and the passengers to head toward a forest between Bandiagara and Bankass, a local group of associations and an elected official said.’
“We demand the release of more than 110 passengers of three buses abducted on Tuesday by jihadists,” a member of the group, Oumar Ongoiba, told AFP.
An elected official from Bandiagara, who wanted to remain anonymous for security reasons, said, “The three buses and the passengers, more than 120, are still being held by jihadists.”
Mali has since 2012 been ravaged by different factions affiliated to Al-Qaeda and the Daesh group, as well as by self-declared, self-defense forces and bandits.
The worsening security situation has been compounded by a humanitarian and political crisis.
The violence spilled over into neighboring Burkina Faso and Niger, with all three countries seeing military regimes seize power.
With homelessness on the rise, US Supreme Court will weigh bans on sleeping outdoors
WASHINGTON: The Supreme Court will consider Monday whether banning homeless people from sleeping outside when shelter space is lacking amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.
The case is considered the most significant to come before the high court in decades on homelessness, which is reaching record levels in the United States.
In California and other Western states, courts have ruled that it’s unconstitutional to fine and arrest people sleeping in homeless encampments if shelter space is lacking.
A cross-section of Democratic and Republican officials contend that makes it difficult for them to manage encampments, which can have dangerous and unsanitary living conditions.
But hundreds of advocacy groups argue that allowing cities to punish people who need a place to sleep will criminalize homelessness and ultimately make the crisis worse.
The Justice Department has also weighed in. It argues people shouldn’t be punished just for sleeping outside, but only if there’s a determination they truly have nowhere else to go.
The case comes from the rural Oregon town of Grants Pass, which started fining people $295 for sleeping outside to manage homeless encampments that sprung up in the city’s public parks as the cost of housing escalated.
The measure was largely struck down by the San Francisco-based 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which also found in 2018 that such bans violated the 8th Amendment by punishing people for something they don’t have control over.
The case comes after homelessness in the United States grew a dramatic 12 percent, to its highest reported level as soaring rents and a decline in coronavirus pandemic assistance combined to put housing out of reach for more Americans, according to federal data.
